3I/ATLAS: THE IMPOSSIBLE ENGINE

The official story is comforting. It is safe. It tells us that 3I/ATLAS, the third interstellar object ever detected in our solar system, was just a fascinating, nickel-rich snowball that swung by the Sun, melted a bit, and is now drifting away. NASA has stamped the file "NATURAL OBJECT," and the scientific community is patting itself on the back for capturing some nice data.
But if you actually look at that data—specifically the numbers released this week regarding the object's surface activity—the "snowball" theory doesn't just crack; it shatters.
We are being told that 3I/ATLAS is a comet. But comets are dead, chaotic things. This object, however, behaved with a terrifying efficiency that looks less like geology and more like engineering.
The "Water" Dump
Let’s start with the headline finding: Water.
The SWAN instrument on the SOHO satellite captured the object releasing a staggering amount of hydrogen. On November 6, just days after skimming past the Sun, 3I/ATLAS was dumping 3.17 × 10²⁹ molecules per second.
To put that into perspective, that is enough water to fill multiple Olympic-sized swimming pools in a matter of seconds.
Scientists call this "sublimation"—ice turning into gas because of the heat. But look at the timing. The release didn't happen in a chaotic burst; it happened in a sustained, high-pressure flood that tapered off with mechanical precision as the object moved away from the heat source. In industrial terms, that doesn't look like a melting rock. It looks like a coolant flush. If you were piloting a nickel-plated vessel close to a star, you would need to dump heat fast. And that is exactly what 3I/ATLAS did.
The 20% Anomaly
Here is the smoking gun, the statistic that should keep every astronomer awake at night.
In a typical solar system comet, the "active" surface area—the part that is actually spitting out gas and dust—is tiny. Usually, only 3% to 5% of a comet's surface is active. The rest is just dead, crusted rock.
But 3I/ATLAS? The data confirms that 20% of its surface was active.
That is not a deviation. That is a different species entirely. For a natural object to maintain surface activity that is four to six times higher than the standard model is virtually unheard of. It suggests that the object isn't covered in random patches of ice. It suggests the object is porous, or perhaps, vented.
Why would 20% of the surface be active? Maybe because 20% of the surface is covered in exhaust ports.
The "Green" Camouflage
The Hubble and Gemini North telescopes noted a distinct "greenish tint" caused by cyanogen and dicarbon, along with a "blue haze" surrounding the nucleus. While these are chemical compounds found in nature, they are also excellent at masking what lies beneath.
This "dirty snowball" is rich in nickel—a heavy metal used in aerospace shielding. It survived a closest approach to the Sun that would have disintegrated a looser pile of rubble. And it did so while maintaining a structural integrity that baffled observers.
The Rush to Normalize
Why was NASA so quick to shut down the theories proposed by astrophysicists like Avi Loeb? Loeb suggested weeks ago that the object's nickel composition and non-gravitational acceleration pointed toward artificial origins. Yet, before the water data was even fully analyzed, the agency issued a blanket statement confirming it was "natural."
They are trying to normalize the anomaly. They want us to see the water release as "ice," not exhaust. They want us to see the 20% activity rate as "unusual," not impossible.
3I/ATLAS is moving away from us now, fading into the dark. It survived the fire of the Sun. It flushed its systems. And now, "clean" and cooled, it is heading to its next destination. We call it a comet because we don't have a category for what it really is. But the math doesn't lie.
Rocks don't behave this way. Machines do.